Edgerton, Kansas, Sues Citizens Over Data Center Petition
Two Kansas women, Kimberly Twente and Carrie Schmidt, organized a petition for a public vote on an $860 million data center project in Edgerton, Johnson County. The City of Edgerton has responded by filing a lawsuit against the women and a nonprofit they founded, arguing the petition to ban data centers as a nuisance is illegal.
Kimberly Twente and Carrie Schmidt, two residents of Kansas, are facing a lawsuit from the City of Edgerton after they circulated a petition to allow voters to decide on an $860 million data center project.
The proposed facility, backed by Dubai-based DAMAC Digital, is planned for a 400,000-square-foot warehouse at Logistics Park Kansas City, located just outside Edgerton in Johnson County. Twente and Schmidt, along with other community members, successfully gathered enough signatures to place the data center vote on the upcoming November ballot. Their concerns center on potential negative impacts, including noise, air quality, and the overall environmental toll these large facilities can impose on nearby communities.
In response to the citizen petition, the City of Edgerton filed a lawsuit against Twente, Schmidt, and the nonprofit Public Trust Collective, which Twente founded. The city's legal action asserts that banning data centers as a "nuisance" through a petition is not legally permissible. The article also highlights the concept of "by right" development, where projects meeting existing code requirements can proceed without a public hearing, effectively bypassing direct community input.